Two of Chicago’s most pivotal but challenging undeveloped sites — Foundry Park on the North Side and the vacant South Loop parcel known as The 78 — moved forward in a big way at Wednesday’s City Council meeting.
Mayor Brandon Johnson introduced a $201.6 million tax increment financing subsidy for JDL Development’s scaled-back vision for North Side industrial land along the Chicago River that was to be home to the Lincoln Yards megaproject.
And despite a slew of concerns from Council members, the full Council approved a $425 million TIF for The 78 (a reference to the parcel’s status as Chicago’s unofficial 78th community area). The subsidy will bankroll public improvements needed for the South Loop development, anchored by a $750 million soccer stadium privately financed by Chicago Fire billionaire owner Joe Mansueto.
Downtown Ald. Bill Conway (34th), whose adjacent TIF is being raided to help The 78, again refused to go along with the $250.1 million piece of the infrastructure package to be used primarily to build a 1,200-space parking garage. The $216 million garage will serve as the “podium” for an open-air plaza and future high-rise development built on the air rights above the garage.
Referring to the Bears’ long-running stadium saga, Conway said Wednesday he appreciates the Fire “not trying to move to Hammond, Indiana, and become the Hammond Sparks.” But he said he “cannot look the taxpayers in the eye and tell them” he supported spending “$250 million to build a stadium parking garage and plaza.”
Finance Chair Pat Dowell, whose 3rd Ward includes The 78, has argued the podium “brings the site to grade at Roosevelt Road” and is the key to “unlocking the site from the isolation that has stalled every previous development proposal.”
Deputy Planning Commissioner Jeff Cohen made that same point Wednesday, with a new wrinkle.
“The idea here is to incorporate that garage into the podium,” Cohen said. “It’s addressing a design and development plan that allows for all of the land within The 78 to be open for investment, rather than having to have either temporary or permanent surface parking lots to accommodate the car traffic.”
The $201.6 million subsidy proposed for Foundry Park pales by comparison to the $1.3 billion former Mayor Rahm Emanuel once proposed for Lincoln Yards. That massive subsidy became a political lightning rod, with the avalanche of criticism led by the Chicago Teachers Union and then-union organizer Brandon Johnson.
The $201.6 million subsidy Johnson introduced at Wednesday’s Council meeting is more likely to be criticized for being too little.
It will support just over 25% of the $800 million worth of roads, bridges, utilities and mass transit improvements Ald. Brian Hopkins 92nd) has said were mandated as part of the Lincoln Yards plan.
Foundry Park developer Jim Letchinger acknowledged there is “other infrastructure that the neighborhood would like to see done that is not possible right now.”
But Letchinger added it’s a start that includes the long-promised extension of the popular 606 Trail. “If you don’t start with something that’s achievable, you can’t achieve anything.”
“We have a plan to actually start building and creating revenue right away in conjunction with building our infrastructure. … A lot of parks. Massive riverwalk. Ten acres of public open space. Very usable, very engaging,” Letchinger said Wednesday.
“As we continue to build, since we’re not using anywhere near all the increment that we’re creating, the other increment can go toward other projects that the neighborhood would like to see — whether it’s to build a bridge or fixing Elston Avenue, or anything else that they’re anxious about,” he said.
Public improvements promised to residents, but not covered by the $201.6 million subsidy, include another bridge crossing the Chicago River and a realignment of Elston Avenue, which Letchinger called a positive move in the long run, but a “massive undertaking” complicated by cost and property control.
“No private developer can realign Elston. It’s impossible. The city is the only one that can do that, and they’re working on it. There’s plans for it. But it will take a very long time,” Letchinger said.
Ald. Scott Waguespack (32nd) said there is “one bridge that a lot of people still want,” but it goes through private properties owned by Ozinga Ready Mix Concrete and several other owners.
“The city would have to do it as a taking [of property], and that would be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. So they took that off the table because … that bridge wasn’t necessary at this time,” Waguespack told the Chicago Sun-Times.
Letchinger’s plan for roughly 34 vacant acres of the site calls for up to 3,737 residences, 20% of them designated as affordable to comply with the city’s set-aside rules. The new design includes low- to mid-rise buildings, some for offices, grouped near open space and riverfront access. Buildings would get ground-floor retail, and one is slated as a boutique hotel.
The project’s reduced density has drawn praise from residents. And Waguespack said he’s satisfied with the reduced public subsidy.
“In the future if there’s more needed, we could go back and do it. But this is much more grounded in a realistic infrastructure project that will still satisfy all the needs of connecting the neighborhoods,” Waguespack said.
Hopkins said he views the scaled-down subsidy and the infrastructure projects as “wholly inadequate” and a broken promise to Lincoln Park and Bucktown residents.
“Lincoln Yards provided for two bridges with the possibility of a third. Foundry Park has zero,” Hopkins said. “I don’t want to move on a vague verbal promise that we might consider adding a bridge later. The time to add it is now while the redevelopment agreement is still pending. And the fact that it was omitted is tragic. Also, the [Elston-Armitage] intersection redesign and the new Metra station seem to have fallen by the wayside.”
Also at Wednesday’s meeting, Johnson proposed a tax break for Chicago’s booming film and television industries — by reducing the 15% personal property lease transaction tax to 11%.
The tax has been raised twice in recent years and was the biggest piece of the revenue package that helped balance the $16.7 billion budget for 2026. It has exceeded revenue projections by $40.3 million through June 30, allowing Johnson to offer the break in hopes of attracting more film and TV productions to Chicago.
Other Council action
The City Council also followed a trail blazed by Gov. JB Pritzker and his counterparts in six other states by prohibiting present and former city employees — and elected officials — from using insider information to bet on prediction markets. Apps including Kalshi and Polymarket are used to place bets on everything from election winners and the number of candidates entering a specific race for office, to budgetary and foreign policy decisions by elected officials.
Championed by Ald. Timmy Knudsen (43rd), the ordinance prohibits current or former city officials, appointees and employees from using “confidential information or any non-public information, including the identity of the subject of an investigation” to either participate in prediction markets or “assist any other person” placing those bets.
The Council also confirmed Johnson’s appointment of Dr. Garth Walker as the city’s public health commissioner.
Wednesday’s meeting was supposed to be the last before the traditional August recess. But Johnson’s aldermanic opponents scheduled another meeting for next week after mayoral allies retaliated against them by using a parliamentary maneuver to block them from placing an advisory referendum on the November ballot askin that would have asked voters if Chicago should make its “contribution to city pension funds in the first quarter of the year to reduce long-term debt.”